Will a man called Elon Musk end Jihad?

01 Oct 2017

EloN MUSK, the legendary inventor and founder of Tesla, the maker of electric cars, may not be aware that he will not only end up controlling pollution by popularising electric cars but will also deal a heavy blow to Jihad, or the Islamist terrorism which has spread the world over.
Jihad does not draw sustenance from the Muslim masses. It is supported by big actors. Saudi Arabia, for instance. Backed by states, funds and propaganda, it can thrive even in the face of a global onslaught.

The electric vehicle (EV) project of Musk hits at the bases of terrorism—ideology and money—by ensuring that oil-based Arabian economies go slowly downhill. Musk’s EV project has scared oil & gas industry which is now staring at a big existential crisis. Saudi Arabia, the main promoter of Jihad across the world, is now trying to prepare for a post-oil future when it will have to slog hard.

In 2013, European Parliament in Strasbourg identified Wahhabism as the main source of global terrorism. Wahhabism is an extreme form of primitive Islam that looks down upon any reformative practice, denounces visits to tombs and shrines and relies on violence to achieve its goals. Wahhabism is the ideological basis and inspiration for Jihad. Al Qaeda, ISIS and Boko Haram are Wahhabists. And so is the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

The more worrying aspect of Saudi export of Wahhabism is that now it has started funding leading western universities too. Its control over institutions of ideas can let it escape the harder scrutiny it would have otherwise invited from the scholars.

Saudi Arabia is the main propagator of Wahhabism across the world. In Asia, the spread of Saudi Wahhabism through seminaries funded by it is a major cause of growing Islamist terror. It is Wahhabism that has made burqas a common sight in many parts of Asia where earlier Muslim women rarely wore any such covering. Pakistan’s descent into terror began with Saudi-funded seminaries spreading messages of extreme hate which resulted in a society where most other branches of Islam are under grave threat. Shias and Ahmedias faced brutal oppression as Wahhabi ideas gained currency.

British Prime Minister Theresa May is suppressing the public release of a sensitive government report into funding of Islamist terror. The report is said to focus on the role of Saudi Arabia.

The more worrying aspect of Saudi export of Wahhabism is that now it has started funding leading western universities too. Its control over institutions of ideas can let it escape the harder scrutiny it would have otherwise invited from the scholars.

And it can also slowly lead to acceptance of Saudi ideas in the west. For example, Saudi funding of a law programme in, say, an Ivy League university, might create scholarship that tries to find benign aspects of draconian Shariah law. Mainstreaming of traditions that have been universally decried as anti-humanity is the main objective of Saudi funding of western universities.

Last year, a leaked report from Germany’s federal intelligence service accused several Gulf groups of funding religious schools and radical Salafist preachers in mosques. The report termed the Saudi plan as “a long-term strategy of influence”. Prevalence of Saudi ideology in a country through mosques and seminaries can also give Saudi Arabia influence with that country’s government.

A few months ago, The Guardian reported that the Home Office of U.K. had admitted that an investigation into the foreign funding and support of jihadi groups that was authorised by David Cameron might never be published. The inquiry into revenue streams for extremist groups operating in the UK was commissioned by the former prime minister and is thought to focus on Saudi Arabia, which has repeatedly been highlighted by European leaders as a funding source for Islamist jihadis, the report said.

Dependent on oil for its prosperity, now Saudi Arabia is looking at a bleak future. If it’s not thriving, one can assume it will not be pumping so much money into extremism.

From the Institute for the Study of Islam and Arabic in Jakarta, which has produced some of Indonesia’s terrorist leaders, to the Deobandi seminaries in the Indian subcontinent, Saudi Arabia-funded institutions promote extremist ideas. Add to these, more sophisticated programmes in universities like Harvard which gladly accept funds from a country notorious for human-rights abuses. Saudi Arabia wields a spectrum of propaganda—from seminaries for youth in poor countries that dish out unadulterated ideology to western universities where academics can form sophisticated arguments in favour of Shariah or will just ignore negative aspects while studying the Saudi traditions.

In the past 50 years, Riyadh has invested at least $86 billion in spreading Wahhabi extremism, according to a study by Britain’s Henry Jackson Society on foreign funding for extremist branches of Islam in Great Britain. But now, it may need to hold tightly to its petro fortune. Dependent on oil for its prosperity, now Saudi Arabia is looking at a bleak future. If it’s not thriving, one can assume it will not be pumping so much money into extremism.

Tony Seba, a serial Silicon Valley entrepreneur, and an instructor in Entrepreneurship, Disruption and Clean Energy at Stanford’s Continuing Studies Program, says that by 2030, 95% of people would not own private cars which would wipe off the automobile industry. He also predicts that electric vehicles would destroy the global oil industry in the same period.

Seba is known as a futurist who does not go wrong. He had correctly predicted a boom in solar power when the prices were 10 times the prices today.
“By 2030, you probably won’t own a car, but you may get a free trip with your morning coffee. Transport-As-A-Service (TaaS) will use only electric vehicles and will upend two trillion dollar industries. It’s the death spiral for cars (and the oil industry). We are on the cusp of one of the fastest, deepest, most consequential disruptions of transportation in history. But there is nothing magical about it. This is driven by the economics,” Seba told website GAS2.

“Global oil demand will peak at 100 million barrels per day by 2020, dropping to 70 million barrels per day by 2030. This will impact different companies and countries disproportionately — and in many cases, dramatically — depending on their exposure to high cost oil,” reports North American Energy News.

Seba says the end of oil would have a geopolitical impact: the economies that depend mostly on oil will be hit badly. Many Arab countries will lose much of their influence and power. Saudi Arabia will be one of them.

A few companies such as Royal Dutch Shell Plc have already figured the risk out. It plans to spend $1 billion a year on its ‘New Energies’ division due to the world transitioning fast towards renewable power and electric cars. Seba says the end of oil would have a geopolitical impact: the economies that depend mostly on oil will be hit badly. Many Arab countries will lose much of their influence and power. Saudi Arabia will be one of them.

Saudi Arabia knows that. For quite some time, it is trying to diversify its economy to reduce dependence on oil. It has created a plan called Vision 2030, which aims at development of non-oil industries and broadbasing investment and social change to boost domestic economy as well as global image.

Though it may not seem obvious, the recent step to allow women to drive is also part of the 2030 plan. It’s not that Saudi Arabia has suddenly realised it must live up to higher human values. Allowing women to drive will save Saudi Arabia the remittances that expat drivers send back to their home countries. It will give women better access to economy. Saudi women, most of whom are well-educated, can do jobs which are now offered to expats.

It will also drive spending as women who are free to move can contribute to more consumer expenditure. Additionally, the step will also attract more foreign investors by boosting the global image of the kingdom, now known as a repressive regime.
Letting women drive is part of several similar changes that have been taking place lately. Saudi Arabia is turning its Red Sea coastline into a global tourism destination as part of a plan to make tourism an alternative source of revenue. The tourist area will be “semi-autonomous” and governed by “independent laws and a regulatory framework developed and managed by a private committee,” which indicates foreigners will be allowed to drink and women could wear bikinis, things without which it cannot dream of drawing rich luxury tourists.

Along with modern dresses and alcohol, cinema too is banned in Saudi Arabia. But the ban has begun loosening. In the past few years, the kingdom has allowed private screening of films in specially selected areas. A top Saudi official, Ahmed al-Khatib, chairman of the General Entertainment Authority (GEA), has even spoken of lifting the ban on cinema. The more Saudi Arabia looks at a post-oil world, the more desperate it gets to transform itself. It is even willing to sacrifice its age-old laws and pick up a quarrel with the clerics.

Charismatic Elon Musk has made electric vehicles hugely popular. That’s why even developing countries such as India are setting all-electric goals. India has decided to allow manufacturing of only electric cars by 2030, 10 years before Britain plans to.

In his book, The Petroleum Triangle: Oil, Globalization, and Terror, Steve A. Yetiv says how oil and globalisation have fuelled terrorism and are responsible for the rise of Al Qaeda. Any threat to oil economy should be a threat to terrorism too.

In the face of a gathering challenge, Saudi Arabia will not be able to keep fuelling Jihad with billions of dollars. A liberal estimate will also hint at the possibility of the kingdom getting modernised and shunning its age-old religious restrictions. Elon Musk may not realise, but history might see him as one man who spelled the end of the oil industry as well as Jihad.